Episode Recap

Nervous legal secretary, Soo Kyung is walking at night. She is startled when an ambulance races by her, presumably to another “don’t ask” victim in the neighbourhood.

Back at the officetel, cheerful former rich girl, Jin Yi scares herself by watching a horror movie. She decides to take it as growing experience and cope with the fear without bothering her neighbours.

The next morning, Soo Kyung sleeps in and wakes up in a panic. While racing around to get ready, she inadvertently lets her Pomeranian, Barassi out, but doesn’t notice in her haste.

When she arrives at work, her boss, Attorney Kim points out her repeated tardiness, and her co-worker, Kyu Sik points out she needs to remarry so someone will wake her in the morning. To top it all off, Soo Kyung realizes she left her phone at home.

Unencumbered by work, Jin Yi goes to the dry cleaners. Instead of the owner, she runs into her crush, charming insurance salesman, Dae Young changing into his clothes. He explains that he keeps his clothes at the dry cleaners, only picking up what he needs for the day.

After they leave, Jin Yi and Dae Young run into a strange man on a moped, carrying Barassi. Dae Young rescues the dog, and promptly hands him over to Jin Yi, whose head explodes into hearts and flowers at how cool he is.

When Jin Yi goes home, she picks up some mail for the dead woman who used to live in her apartment. When she arrives at her apartment, Jin Yi starts to get scared, as she discovers that the window is open, and the intercom turns itself on. Later, Jin Yi’s mug of hot water goes flying off the table when she attempts to make herself some tea. When Barassi barks, Jin Yi runs screaming out the door.

Back at the office, Kyu Sik is almost caught stealing one of Soo Kyung’s emergency chocolates, but luckily, Attorney Kim drags Soo Kyung away before she notices. Later, Dae Young arrives in the office to take them out to lunch, and not very subtly tries to convince Kyu Sik to get insurance. When Dae Young realizes that Attorney Oh has a large extended family, he targets her instead, much to her joy. The two men compete over sucking up to Attorney Oh, with Kyu Sik as the clear winner.

Later, when Dae Young suggests they go somewhere else for a coffee, Attorney Oh sends Kyu Sik away, leaving her alone with Dae Young. Once they’re alone, Dae Young feeds her a bullshit story about being unable to date, because of his deceased first love, then uses her sympathy to talk her into buying insurance.

Waiting outside the court for Attorney Kim, Soo Kyung frets over whether she turned off her stove. When Attorney Kim appears, he’s entranced as she runs to him joyfully, but disappointed when she grabs his phone to call her friend (and Kyu Sik’s wife) Kyung Mi to check her stove. She follows that up by insisting they eat tteokbokki cooked on the spot. She launches into her usual orgasmic eating routine, as Attorney Kim reminisces about watching her eat from afar in university.

Meanwhile, Kyung Mi belatedly notices that Barassi is missing from Soo Kyung’s apartment. When she hears him barking, Kyung Mi finds him in the hallway with Jin Yi, who is still too scared to go into her apartment. They end up going grocery shopping together, where Kyung Mi accidentally reveals that not only was Soo Kyung as scared as Jin Yi when she started living alone, but also that Soo Kyung is divorced and that she can’t eat by herself. They’re interrupted by a phone call from the bank, informing Kyung Mi that Kyu Sik has agreed to pay his sister’s debt. That night, Kyung Mi sweetly invites Kyu Sik to come home early, then puts a pillow over his face, and beats him.

Back at the office, Soo Kyung and Attorney Oh end up staying late to work, but Attorney Oh is more interested in bragging about her “date” with Dae Young. When Soo Kyung finally goes home, she’s so scared at being followed in the dark that she happily runs towards a nonplussed Dae Young. It turns out the person following her was Attorney Kim, who wanted to make sure she was safe. Unacknowledged, Attorney Kim goes back to his car, where he finds Soo Kyung’s hairpin on the passenger seat.

Attorney Kim has a flashback to their university days, where he gave Soo Kyung a similar hairpin and ran away, only to see it later on Kyung Mi. The parade of memories continues with her job interview at his law office, during which she failed to recognize him, thus arousing his ire. Back in the present, Attorney Kim vows revenge and tosses Soo Kyung’s hairpin out the window.

Soo Kyung, meanwhile, arrives back at the officetel with Dae Young, to find a terrified Jin Yi standing in the hallway with Barassi. They quickly debunk Jin Yi’s suspicions of a ghost, then Dae Young promises Jin Yi to feed her something that will repel any ghost. A hungry Soo Kyung invites herself along for cut noodles with red bean. They all eat orgasmically, but not before Dae Young gives his usual lecture, about red beans being like love.

When they finish, the conversation devolves into an argument between Soo Kyung and Dae Young, until Jin Yi chimes in to propose that the three of them start eating together. Soo Kyung and Dae Young reluctantly agree.

Back at the officetel, a repairman looks at the broken CCTV in their hallway, and points out that it was broken on purpose.

Comments

It’s episode 4, and the joke of Attorney Oh being unattractive and imagining that everyone is in love with her is already old.

It briefly crossed my mind in this episode that if this show weren’t so lighthearted, almost all the characters would look like jerks, from fast-talking Dae Young to stalker-ish Attorney Kim to paranoid and unfriendly Soo Kyung to husband-beating Kyung Mi. The show plays everyone’s negative traits for laughs, because otherwise it could be easy to dislike them. Maybe it’s a good thing Jin Yi was there to sprinkle her optimistic fairy dust on everyone.

Tteokbokki cooked on the spot (즉석떡볶이)
I have to admit that after watching this scene, I’ve become near obsessed with eating tteokbokki like this, and yet, I’ve missed every opportunity to do it.

Cut noodles with red bean (팥칼국수)
I’m sure this is delicious, but its lack of visual appeal made it hard to think so while watching.